Selling 'heritage' products

A large chunk of the UK album market in 2008 has been claimed by deeply unfashionable 'heritage' artists who still ring the bells of the 50 and 60 plus audience. Characters like Marty Wilde (69) and Joe Brown (67), and the late Billy Fury, have all had record releases. The Temptations were back in the Top 10 in March and the Searchers narrowly missed making it.

All of those titles were released by Universal Music TV, part of Universal.

The term “50 quid man” has been around for ages and is generally perceived as a music-monthly-reading fortysomething, making repeated impulse purchases to replace his old David Bowie vinyl with CDs or even download equivalents.

The consumers of this real oldie music are very different and thought to be much older, with lots of dosh and rather out of the habit of spending it on music.

This article in the Times tells the tale of how this forgotten group of consumers has been persuaded back into music buying habits with lots of lessons for other “heritage” products. Dick Stroud